Thursday, October 2, 2014

Two Roads Release

Juliette and Jase may be out of Dornan's
immediate reach, but as tensions rise, will they end up walking right into the
enemy's trap?

Can Juliette forgive Jase for his
devastating betrayal, or will it destroy everything they've been fighting for?

Excerpt:Two Roads

He killed my father. I’m having his baby.

He killed my father. I’m having his baby.

Those two sentences are on repeat in my
head, the agony of the rolling waves almost too much for me to bear.

And the agony of my nausea slams into me
again with the violent rock of the waves that carry us to safer shores. I
think. I hope.

But really, how safe am I? I’m suddenly
questioning everything, stuck in a vortex of swirling paranoia and doubt. Is
Jase on Dornan’s side? He killed my father. He didn’t even try to deny it.

I can’t believe it, I can’t accept it,
and I just wish I could think straight for five fucking minutes. I wish I
didn’t feel like this. I’ve left one prison, the one Dornan constructed for me,
only to be trapped in one of my own making. The one in my mind that goes over
and over and over again.

I’m curled as tight as I can get into a
ball on a bed in the main cabin of the boat. We must be going pretty fast, or
be in some crazy swell, because I swear if the boat tilted a little more, it’d
capsize.

The door is closed. I made Elliot promise
he wouldn’t let Jase come in here. I’m going to have to face him eventually,
but I just can’t face him now. I don’t want to hear his excuses, if he even has
any. He killed my father.

I’ve never been afraid of drowning
before, but right now, I’m terrified. Drowning in this ship. Drowning in lies
and in blood. Drowning in my own treacherous deceit. For so long, I’ve had only
one goal – to destroy Dornan. I was too busy focusing on his suffering to
notice or care about my own, and now, I feel so damned broken. I don’t know if
I’ll ever be able to feel normal again.

In fact, come to think of it, I don’t
even know what normal is.

I jump as a warm hand touches my
shoulder.

“Hey,” a low voice murmurs beside me.

I turn over to see Elliot lying beside
me, his pose mirroring mine. I can see water lashing against the small round
window that looks out to the cruel sea we travel within.

“You’re shaking,” Elliot says, frowning
as he reaches out a hand to me. Without thinking, I shrink back, an automatic
response after three months of Dornan’s psychotic hands being the only ones to
reach for me. Elliot’s face crumples into something resembling
sadness—despair—as he reaches out to me again, slower this time, and pushes my
lank hair back from my face.

Am I even here? I’m not sure. This could
all be a dream. An elaborate, drug-induced hallucination. The thought makes me
reel. Am I out? Or am I still in the basement? Is Elliot in front of me, or is
it Dornan?

I scramble away from Elliot, clambering
off the bed and backing up to the far end of the tiny room. Behind me, waves
pound violently into the thick glass porthole, the only thing separating us
from the deadly currents beyond. The movement of the waves catches my attention
and I turn, mesmerized, as I press a trembling palm up to the freezing cold
glass.

Am I here? Am I alive?

A nudge in my stomach, nothing more than
a flutter really, propels me back to sanity.

Yes. I am here. I am here, while Elliot
hovers behind me, and Jase and Luis are somewhere beyond the door that keeps me
safe in this room.

And I am carrying a baby inside me. A
baby that should never have existed.

Lili writes dark romance, suspense and paranormal stories.
Her serial novel, Seven Sons, was released in early 2014, with the following
books in the series to be released in quick succession. Lili quit corporate
life to focus on writing and so far is loving every minute of it. Her other
loves in life include her gorgeous husband and beautiful daughter, good coffee,
Tarantino movies and spending hours on Pinterest.